Irwin Mitchell’s specialist International Personal Injury lawyers were instructed to investigate the cause of a number of passengers’ illnesses after they fell ill with gastric symptoms and chest infections during and after stays on the vessel between December 2014 and January 2015.

Passengers affected by the problems told their expert legal team of concerns related to cleanliness on the ship with one passenger claiming that within the restaurant the table linen and utensils were sometimes dirty.

There were also issues related to some of the food served on board which was sometimes left out for long periods of time and was on occasions served lukewarm and some of the passengers also noted that some staff did not wear gloves when serving food.

Other passengers reported waking up to a soaking wet carpet with little done to deal with the issue aside from putting air blowers into the cabin which had little effect causing the entire cabin to smell of damp. They also noted black soot flying around on the day of disembarkment which burned a hole in the blouse of one of the passengers.

One member of the group Tracy Owen, from Holbury, Southampton, revealed how the illness she suffered during her special Christmas holiday with her son has continued to affect her life more than 12 months on. They had gone on the cruise to take her mind off the fact it was the anniversary of her father’s death but she suffered horrible gastric symptoms on Boxing Day.

Jennifer Downing, the specialist international personal injury lawyer at Irwin Mitchell who is representing Tracy and others affected by problems on the Thomson Majesty ship, said:

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“We are disappointed to have had to issue court proceedings as we had hoped to agree a settlement out-of-court but the tour operator has left us with no choice but to take this course of action as we seek to resolve the legal case on our clients behalf.

“We heard a number of worrying first-hand accounts from a number of passengers who fell ill on the Thomson Majesty cruise ship across this two-month period. The seriousness of illnesses of this nature should never be downplayed, as we see many cases in which people develop long-term health implications as a result of such problems.

“All of our clients are desperate for answers regarding how their illnesses emerged, as well as reassurances as to what steps if any can be taken to prevent others from facing the same problems in the future. There are a number of procedures that can be followed and adopted to help prevent the spread of illness.”

Jennifer Downing, Solicitor

Shop assistant, Tracy, 44, was coming to the end of her cruise on the Thomson Majesty with her 12 year-old son Billy when she developed vomiting and diarrhoea on Boxing Day 2014. To make matters worse for Tracy, the illness also exacerbated her existing problems with irritable bowel syndrome and she now suffers additional symptoms as a result.

She recalls: “Billy was already suffering with the symptoms when I fell ill and it was absolutely awful. I also suffered stomach cramps and a fever, but was only given some medical advice from staff on board as we were due to disembark. I found it disgusting that we were told that as we were due to disembark there was nothing they could do despite the fact that we had a plane journey and an hour coach journey during which we potentially exposed other travellers to our illness.

“It is disappointing that over two years later Thomson is still putting up a fight after our ordeals on board the ship. Hopefully it can now be sorted as quickly as possible.”

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